Well look the timing of this headline.
Double digit rate hike for current
Thursday 10th April, 2008
Trinidad Guardian
AS CONSUMERS struggle to make ends meet given the hefty increases in the price of food, the Trinidad and Tobago Electricity Commission (T&TEC) announced that the cost of electricity to its residential, commercial, industrial and street-lighting customers will increase in 20 days.
The new electricity rate structure establishes three usage bands so that customers who use less electricity will pay a lower rate, T&TEC said in a statement yesterday.
In the new structure, residential customers will pay 27 cents a kilowatt/hour for the first 400 kilowatts they use, 31 cents per unit for each kilowatt/hour between 400 and 1,000 and 35 cents per unit for electricity consumed above 1,000 kilowatt/hour.
“Electricity is now a cost you can control and from May 1, peoples’ bills will be based on consumption,” said T&TEC spokesman Steve Martel.
An Arima customer, who paid $197.51 for using 716 units of electricity in the two-month period ending February 12, will pay an estimated $241.45 from May 1—an increase of 22.24 per cent.
An El Socorro customer who used 435 units of electricity in the two-month period ending March 3 paid $122.35.
This will increase to $141.28 from May 1 which is an additional 15.5 per cent.
In its statement, T&TEC said the new rate structure for residential customers which had been approved in June 2006 takes full effect from May 1, 2008.
For residential customers, increases range between 30 cents per day and $1.15 per day, according to the Commission.
T&TEC insisted that the new tariff structure has simplified the billing process as “customers are required to pay only for energy consumed.”
T&TEC said that it would eliminate the exchange rate adjustment and the fuel charge adjustment from electricity bills from May 1 but the customer charge and VAT would remain as additional charges.
Residential
For consumption up to 400kWh—27 cents per kWh and customers will incur an increase of no more than 30 cents per day.
n For consumption greater than 400 kWh and up to 1000 kWh, customers will pay 27 cents per kWh for the first 400 kWh and 31 cents for every kWh thereafter.
The increase is not expected to exceed $1.15
n For consumption greater than 1000 kWh, customers will pay 27 cents per kWh for the first 400 kWh, 31 cents for the next 600 kWh and 35 cents per kWh above 1000 kWh. The increase is not expected to exceed $1.15.
How to calculate it
If you used 700 units of electricity in a two- month cycle, you need to multiply the first 400 units by 27 cents = $108. Then, you need to multiply 300 units by 31 cents = $93, add the $4 customer charge which remains and the 15 per cent VAT and the total bill will be $235.75
